According to a report by anonymous members of the industry supply chain who supply components to Apple, the Cupertino based firm could cut shipments of the Apple iPad mini by 10-12 million units in the second quarter. The drop in shipments of the 7.9 inch slate could be as high as 20% on a sequential basis in April as the tech giant wants to conserve parts for the production of the sequel model of the Apple iPad mini.
While the next version of Apple’s 7.9 inch tablet is expected to be launched in the third quarter, some of the sources believe that the reason for the shipping cut has nothing to do with a sequel to the iPad mini and instead has to do with increased competition in the low priced 7 inch sector by various Android tablets.
According to the sources, the Cupertino based tech titan has adjusted its 2013 shipping schedule to 33 million iPads and 55 million iPad mini units. One of the most expected changes on a new Apple iPad mini would be a replacement of the rather low resolution screen with a panel offering a Retina display.
A beautiful display, powerful A5 chip, FaceTime HD camera, iSight camera with 1080p HD video recording, ultrafast wireless, and over 275,000 apps ready to download from the App Store. iPad mini is an iPad in every way, shape, and slightly smaller form.
Everything you love about iPad — the beautiful screen, fast and fluid performance, FaceTime and iSight cameras, thousands of amazing apps, 10-hour battery life* — is everything you’ll love about iPad mini, too. And you can hold it in one hand.
Colors are vivid and text is sharp on the iPad mini display. But what really makes it stand out is its size. At 7.9 inches, it’s perfectly sized to deliver an experience every bit as big as iPad.
Right from the start, apps made for iPad also work with iPad mini. They’re immersive, full-screen apps that let you do almost anything you can imagine. And they make iPad mini practically impossible to put down.
With advanced Wi-Fi that’s up to twice as fast as any previous-generation iPad and access to fast cellular data networks around the world, iPad mini lets you download content, stream video, and browse the web at amazing speeds.
Powerful A5 chip.
iPad is known for its fast, fluid performance, and iPad mini doesn’t disappoint. It features the powerful and power-efficient A5 chip, which makes everything you do feel smooth and natural. From the little things like switching from app to app and swiping from page to page, to the big things like editing photos, watching movies, and playing games.
10-hour battery life.
iPad mini wouldn’t be an iPad without incredible battery life. Even with so much performance packed into such a small space, it still lasts up to 10 hours on a single charge. So you can read, watch, play, write, and create whatever you want, as long as you want.
Wave hello with FaceTime video calling.
With FaceTime built into iPad mini, you can make a video call over Wi-Fi or cellular. The front-facing FaceTime HD camera gives everyone a great view of you, while the iSight camera on the back lets you show others what you’re seeing. So even when you’re out and about, your friends and family are never out of the loop. You can hear every laugh and see every smile. And with the 7.9-inch display, you’ve got more than enough screen to take in the whole scene. You can also use the front-facing camera for taking self-portraits or recording 720p HD video.
Record HD video in full 1080p.
An impromptu performance on the subway, the winning shot at your daughter’s soccer game, an awesome 360-degree view from the top of the mountain — the iSight camera on iPad mini lets you capture all these unpredictable, beautiful, spectacular moments. In 1080p HD, no less. The spacious iPad mini display gives you a great view of whatever you’re filming. And with automatic video stabilization, your recording is free of bumps and shakes. So your videos are instantly ready to share.
Just ask Siri.
Siri is the intelligent assistant that helps you get things done, just by asking. Talk to Siri as you would to a person: Ask “Do I need an umbrella?” or “Did the Giants win last night?” or “What time is the barbecue on Sunday?” Siri not only understands what you say, it knows what you mean. It figures out the right apps to use to find the right answer. Then, just like a personal assistant, Siri provides you with the information you need
A new way to get connected.
iPad mini is so thin and light, it requires an ultraslim connector. It’s called the Lightning connector, and it features an all-digital, eight-signal design that’s significantly more durable than the 30-pin connector. Another brilliant feature of Lightning: It’s reversible. Which means there’s no wrong way to plug in the cable.
Lightning to 30-pin Adapter.
If you have an iPad accessory that depends on the 30-pin connector, you can still connect it to your iPad mini. Simply use a Lightning to 30-pin Adapter(sold separately).
Few Minutes left ! Our Live Blog has started ! Enjoy 🙂
The theater is filling up fast — a ton of media are there!
Grizzly Bear on the sound system.
A lot of app developers and partners in the crowd, it seems.
“Ladies and gentlemen, please switch devices to silent mode.”
And it has begun! Tim Cook is now on stage, ready to discuss the great success of Apple.
Tim is out and talked about the success of the iPhone 5. Now we’re watching a video about the launch. People are cheering. And running. And the song is about running.
Running towards an iPhone.
Then the iPhone kisses you.
And you get married.
High fives all around for iPhone 5 buyers.
Look, people bought the iPhone all over the world.
And Tim is back out.
“Our team works incredibly hard to deliver products like the iPhone 5, and that reminds us why we do it.”
“Last month we announced the iPhone and incredible new iPods. An amazingly thin iPod touch, with the same Retina display we have on iPhone 5.”
“All of our iOS devices are powered by iOS 6, our latest version of the world’s most advanced mobile operating system.”
“We work hard to make sure all of our products are upgradable to the latest operating system. After just 1 month, we have 200 million devices running iOS 6.”
“This is phenomenal. It’s the fastest upgrade rate of any software in history that we’re aware of.”
“iOS 6 and Mountain Lion are designed to make our systems work seamlessly.”
“We’ve been working on new features that make your life easier, like documents in the cloud.”
“Customers have now placed 125m documents in the cloud, just over the last year.”
“Features like iMessage, it’s of course the best way to send anyone a message on a Mac or iPod touch or iPad, you can see all your messages on all devices.”
“Already in just last year, customers have sent 300 billion messages.”
Cheers for that from the crowd. And some whistles.
“You’re sending them at 28k per second. Maybe more right now.”
“And features like Game Center, the best way to play games with a friend. We now have over 160m game players.”
“And finally shared photo streams — the best way to share what you want with the people you want.”
“Customers have already shared over 70m photos with friends and family.”
“So you can see there are some great ways for your iOS devices and Macs to work together seamlessly.”
“These are not stretched out iPhone apps.”
“We’ve reached another milestone — customers have downloaded 35 billion apps from the store. This is jaw dropping.”
“Now, this is great for customers. They get the choice of fantastic apps. But it’s also great for devs. We’ve now paid out $6.5 billion to developers.”
“Now one of the most popular apps on the store is iBooks.”
“One tap and you get to the iBookstore.”
400 books downloaded since the launch of the store. That’s a lot of books.
“And iBooks includes great options like this sepia theme, or night theme.”
“Today we’re introducing a new version with a new feature — continuous scrolling — just flick.”
“There’s also some new ways to share — tap on a passage and share on Facebook or Twitter.”
New languages, Korean, Japanese.
“Now I’d like to talk about the Mac.”
“The Mac has been outgrowing the PC market for 6 years straight.”
“That’s because it’s #1 in customer reliability.”
“This has led to the Mac being the #1 desktop and #1 notebook in the US.”
“Now we’re really pleased with all of the momentum of the Mac. But we are not standing still.”
“We’re going to continue innovating with the Mac. We’ve got some great stuff to show you this morning.”
Phil Schiller is out! .. BIG CHEERS
“Today is a big day for the Mac. It starts with MacBook.”
“Just a few months ago we introduced perhaps the best we’ve ever created the best ever.”
Phil is listing off great reviews of the MacBook with Retina display.
“You might not know that our best selling notebook is the 13 inch MacBook Pro.”
“Customers love it. It’s perfect for so many uses. So in typical Apple fashion, we’re going to take our best product, and introduce something better.”
“I’m proud to introduce the brand new 13-inch MacBook Pro.”
“It is incredibly thin. Just .75 thick.”
“A full 1/5th thinner than the old model.”
“It weighs just 3.5 pounds. Our lightest MacBook Pro ever.”
No optical drive. Go figure!
Retina display!
“Everything on it looks absolutely gorgeous.”
“Your apps look fantastic on it. Reading email the text is so beautiful you can’t see the pixels.”
“iLife apps are great too.”
“There’s never been a small notebook that gave pro photographers this capability.”
“If you’re looking for Retina apps, just go to our App Store. There’s a lot of great software to support the display.”
“So that alone is a great new feature. But there’s more.”
FaceTime HD camera, dual mics, stereo speakers.
“Let’s take the bottom off and take a look inside.”
“We use asymmetric li-ion batteries.”
Core i5 or i7.
Standard 8GB of RAM.
Up to 768GB of storage — SSD of course.
Phil is listing off some of the features of Mountain Lion and iCloud.
Because you know, this computer has Mountain Lion on it.
“This is a great new MacBook Pro. It starts at 8GB of RAM and 128GB of flash storage for $1699.”
With a 2.5GHz CPU.
“It starts shipping today.”
“Like all of our products, the team works hard on making these eco-friendly.”
“We’re so excited to show this to customers, we’ve created an ad. Let’s show that.” Ah ha, an ad.
“For the pro in all of us” says the ad.
Phil is showing off the full lineup of MacBooks — and prices.
“Next, Mac mini. You knew there’d be something called mini in this presentation, didn’t you?”
“The Mac mini is packed with great features. But the action on this product and the update is on the inside.”
Wow Phil is rushing through the Mac mini…
New mini starts shipping today. And it’s also eco-friendly.
“We said this is a big day for the Mac, and I have one more I’d like to talk about. And that’s the iMac.”
“It’s the #1 desktop model in the US.”
“It’s a great design. One that’s evolved over many years. Many people think of it as the flagship of the Mac line.”
Phil is going through the history of the iMac. “We’ve had 7 generations of the iMac, all better than the last.”
People are oohing, literally.
Super thin display.
“We have one here. Want to see one?”
“There’s an entire computer in here.” Laughs for that.
80% thinner than the previous generation.
“That edge is 5mm thin.”
“We lovingly call this the chin.”
“This is so thin we wanted to do something even more with it — the way this is welded is called friction stir welding.”
“Let me bring up the old generation — isn’t it incredible how something new can make something else look so old?”
Phil is explaining the process of making the iMac thinner than the previous version.
“Let’s talk a little bit more about this display. It comes in two sizes, 27 inch and 21.5 inch.”
“We said it’s fully laminated. That delivers another benefit. Text and graphics will look like they’re sitting right on top of the glass.”
“We want to make it even purer, even thinner.”
75% less reflection than the previous version.
“It’s very very cool.”
FaceTime HD camera, stereo sound “That sounds better than the previous generation.”
“Pretty remarkable. And of course, a lot of the work has been done on the inside.”
Up to 3TB of storage, Core i5 or i7…
Four USB 3.0 ports.
“I want to talk about storage a little bit more. Customers can choose what they want, a hard drive for storage, or an SSD for speed. But we have a new option. It’s called the Apple Fusion Drive.”
“What’s the Fusion Drive?”
“You order it and get a single drive.”
Core applications and OS stays on the SSD, documents stay on the HDD.
Apple has some logic which figures out which apps you use the most and will shift those to the SSD.
Performance is nearly that of a standard SSD. Very, very interesting.
“The iMac comes with a wireless keyboard and a mouse, of course you can get a Magic Trackpad. And for those of you still stuck in the past, you can get an optical drive.”
“We start shipping next month, in November.”
“This uses up to 50% less power when idling.”
“So that’s the new iMac. Perhaps the boldest new design we’ve done.”
And Tim is back out.
“These products are really cool.”
“Next I’d like to talk about iPad.”
“It seems like every time we get together, there are some new numbers to talk about the growth of this product.”
“We’ve now sold over 100 million iPads.” Huge applause for that.
“We sold more products in the June quarter than any PC manufacturer sold in their entire PC line.”
“This has attracted a lot of attention. A lot of other tablets are shipping. But the numbers tell a different story. The iPad accounts for 91% of tablet web traffic.”
“Why is the iPad so popular? Well it turns out there’s a simple reason: people love their iPads!” Laughs.
“They love the display. They love the camera for FaceTime. They love that they can connect anywhere they go on Wi-Fi or cellular. They love iPad’s legendary all day battery life. And they love all of the amazing apps optimized for iPad.”
“One of the things that is so rewarding is how quickly iPad has been embraced in education.”
“A teacher in Texas said ‘the iPad has been a game changer in education’.”
“We really believe in this. And we saw it early on. Earlier this year we introduced iBooks author to create textbooks. And iBooks textbooks are now available for 80% of the US high school curriculum.”
“There are now 2500 classrooms in the US with iBooks textbooks.”
“Today we’re announcing the latest iBooks Author. It includes some great new templates.”
Portrait templates, you’re able to use your own fonts… mathematical expressions dropped into books. Multitouch widgets.
“Publishers can update their books.”
This is available today.
“In addition to education, iPad is taking the business world by storm too.”
“It’s showing up and doing more and more things.”
94% of Fortune 500 companies are testing or deploying the iPad.
“We couldn’t be more thrilled with how quickly iPad has been embraced by users.”
“But we know we are just getting started.”
“Earlier this year we announced an iPad with a Retina display. It’s the top selling tablet in the world.”
“But we’re not taking our foot off the gas. We’ve got some cool stuff to show you. I’d like to invite Phil back to the stage.”
“Thank you.”
“So just half a year ago we introduced the 3rd generation iPad with Retina display. So it’s more incredible that we’re sitting here to talk about the 4th generation iPad.”
“It’s amazing the pace the team is working at.”
“This 4th generation is a powerhouse. What’s inside it? A new chip, the A6X. It doubles the performance of CPU tasks.”
“It also doubles the graphics performance. The competition wasn’t even close to us, and now we’re just blowing past them some more.”
“We’re updating the camera, the cellular version has expanded LTE.”
Faster Wi-Fi, Lightning connector.
“We’ve added some new cables. Lightning to USB and Lightning to an SD card reader.”
“It comes in both black and white.”
Same configs of the last generation.
$499, with cellular, $629.
“So what else can we do to help customers to find more uses for iPad?”
Whoa. A smaller iPad just appeared on the screen.
“What can you do with this that you can’t do with the big iPad? Well this. Hold it with one hand.”
“This isn’t just a shrunken down iPad. There’s nothing as amazing as this.”
“It’s incredibly thin and beautiful. Incredibly thin and light. Want to see one in person?”
“This is iPad mini.”
For mini, it still looks kind of big!
Black and white — a treatment more like the iPhone 5.
“What screen size is it?”
7.9 inch display
“All the software made for the iPad works on the mini with no change.”
“So it’s great for reading your email, surfing the web, managing your photos.”
“For kicking back and reading a magazine or a book.”
“It’s great for all of your iWork apps.”
Phil is really running through all of the apps you can run on this thing. Hint: it’s all of them!
“You’re gonna love Facebook on the new iPad.”
“If you love playing games, like Real Racing 2. Incredible.”
“I could do 275k examples! But we don’t have time.”
“It all works. And no one else can say that.”
“Here we have iPad mini on the right, and the new Android tablet on the left.”
“Let’s compare them.”
“There’s is made of plastic, it’s thicker and heavier.”
“Let’s look at those displays. Theirs is 7 inch, our is 7.9.”
“The iPad mini has a third larger display area.”
“And it doesn’t stop there. What’s the #1 thing people do on their iPads? Surf the web.”
“Let’s look at a webpage side by side.”
“The iPad mini is about 50% larger display area in the browser.”
“Customers love the ones written for the iPad.”
“What does the other one have? Phone applications scaled up.”
Phil is comparing app versions. Yelp, eBay, Pandora, TripAdvisor.
Pretty bad burns on Android — the platform looks weak on apps, as usual, for tablets.
“There’s an amazing set of technology that makes this a great iPad.”
A5, LTE versions, FaceTime HD camera, 5MP iSight camera around back.
Lightning connector, of course.
“All of this technology in such a thin and light device… the team has worked to get the same battery life. 10 hours.”
“You can see this is every inch an iPad. We’ve created a video to tell you a lot more about it.”
Jony Ive… is talking… about design.
If Apple can hit a killer price point on this, it’s game over for smaller tablets on the market.
“When we decided to make the iPad mini, we wanted to keep the things that make the iPad so magical.”
The iPad mini has the thinnest single cell battery we’ve ever designed.”
I wonder how the smaller bezel will impact reading…
And Phil is back out!
“This is every inch an iPad. As you see it comes with a great line of accessories.”
“It starts with a 16GB of storage, and will be priced at $329.”
That’s the lowest price yet for an iPad.”
Pre orders start this Friday. Wi-Fi versions shipping November 2nd.
“We have a TV ad we’re going to run.”
Oh this is cute. The big iPad is playing Heart and Soul. And the smaller one joins in.
Tears of joy.
Huge Applause !
HUGE
“Let me turn it back to Tim.”
“We told you earlier this year that you would see incredible innovation, and I think we kept our promise.”
Tim is listing off all that Apple has done this year.
… “Yes, it has been an incredible year.”
“We hope you love these products as much as we love creating them.”
“I’d personally like to thank all of the teams at Apple for dedicating their lives to making the best products on Earth.”
And that’s a wrap! Thank You For visiting Elie Chahine’s blog ! Subscribe to Stay Up To Date with our Latest Posts! Check The Full Review of The new iPad mini!
Watch The iPad mini keynote in less than 4 minutes:
Diverting some of the attention away from Apple’s ‘iPad mini’ unveiling on October 23 and Microsoft’s Windows Phone 8 event on October 29, Google is to unveil a number new devices and software improvements on the same day as Microsoft – and we have all the details.
A source with knowledge of Google’s plans has told TNW that the search giant has been distributing a video recorded at one of its weekly all-hands “TGIF” meetings on its internal network, which details the devices that will be unveiled at its hastily arranged October 29 event (which we will also be attending).
Confirming leaks from various inventory systems and advertisements in both the US and the UK, Google will release a 32GB variant of the Nexus 7. However, our source also tells us that there will be a second 32GB variant that will offer HSPA+ (3G) support, allowing users to take the tablet on their travels.
Google has also been working with Samsung to launch a 10-inch tablet, confirming leaks which suggested Google had teamed up with the Korean manufacturer for another device. Our source tells us that internally the tablet goes under the name “Codename Manta”, runs Google’s new Android 4.2 operating system (previously referred to as Key Lime Pie, but is set to retain the Jelly Bean branding), and will offer a 2560×1600 pixel (10:16) resolution, which we believe will offer around 300 pixels per inch (PPI) compared to the new iPad’s 264 PPI.
The Manta codename also ties up with Android Police’s sleuthing, where it was suggested the launch of a 10-inch tablet device. We believe the Samsung tablet will be called the ‘Nexus 10′ but we were unable to confirm at the time of publishing.
Earlier this week, we posted details on the next Nexus smartphone, which will be manufactured by LG. We have been informed that earlier leaks have been 100 percent correct.
This means that Google will launch the LG Nexus 4, featuring a quad-core 1.5 GHz Qualcomm APQ8064 Snapdragon processor, 4.7-inch 1280 x 768 display, 2GB RAM, 16GB storage, an 8-megapixel rear-facing camera (and 1.3-megapixel front-facing snapper) and a 2100mAh battery.
The LG Nexus 4 will also be powered by Google’s new Android 4.2 software.
Speaking of the OS itself, we have some details on that too. It has been confirmed that as part of Android 4.2, Google will introduce ‘Content in the center,’ which will allow users to access Play Store content from a widget and ‘Tablet Sharing’ which will suit families and enterprise users, providing them with a simple and easy to switch between several users on a tablet, each with their own email and apps.
Think Windows user switching, but now on Android.
Our source says that Android 4.2 will compete with Apple’s iOS 6, in that the panoramic camera settings will be updated to support both horizontal and vertical movement by default.
While Microsoft is holding its event in San Francisco on October 29, Google has chosen to hold its own event in New York.
Google’s event tagline of “The playground is open” suggests there will be quite a lot to experience and play with at the event. From what we have seen (and confirmed with Google sources), this is certainly the case.
Reuters has confirmed that Apple will apparently seek to upstage Microsoft with an October 23rd special event during which the Apple iPad mini will be introduced. On October 26th, Microsoft is expected to unveil its line of Microsoft Surface tablets. According to Reuters, Apple’s tablet with the 7.85 inch screen will be priced to compete with the low priced 7 inch Android tablets like the Amazon Kindle Fire HD and the 8GB model of the Google Nexus 7. Both of those slates are priced at $199.
On Friday, All Things D said that its sources have told them that Apple would hold an “invitation-only” event on October 23rd where the long rumored mini version of Apple’s tablet will finally be made official. As far back as December 2010, a picture showed what was rumored to be a miniature version of the Apple iPad although it was never confirmed. Now, 22 months later, the device looks to be a reality. One Wall Street analyst, who got to play with the device while touring Asian component suppliers, called it a more mobile version of Apple’s tablet that easily slipped into the pocket on his sports coat while fitting his palm like a glove.
In pricing the device at around the same price point where the low priced 7 inch Android tablets reside, Apple will be giving up some of its profit margin in order to defend its extremely high market share in the tablet market. A recent survey from IDC showed the Apple iPad with a commanding 68.2% of the global tablet market. During the recent patent trial with Samsung, Apple said that its profit margin on U.S. sales of the iPad ranged from 23% to 32% from October 2010 through March 2012. Considering that Amazon has said that it sells its $199 tablet at cost, there is not going to be much room for Apple to make money. This could be the beginning of a crack in the company’s earnings that the bears on Apple’s stock have been looking for. Apple’s shares have recently tumbled from the $700 level hit after the release of the Apple iPhone 5 to the current price near $630, a 10% decline.
Sterne Agee analyst Shaw Wu says that if Apple prices the Apple iPad mini in the $299-$349 range, it will keep the same profit margins as it has with the larger version of the tablet. Even if it prices the tablet below $299, Wu says that the Cupertino based firm can still make a decent profit by limiting native storage on the device to 8GB instead of the 16GB on the larger model. The Apple iPad mini is rumored to be Wi-Fi onlywith Apple keeping data connectivity for its higher priced models.
Elie Chahine 